The problem SalePilot solves
A sale run by hand can start late, end late, or leave a price cut in place. Every hour outside its plan is margin given away, or demand that met the wrong price.
8%of operating profit per 1% of price
“A price rise of 1 percent, if volumes remained stable, would generate an 8 percent increase in operating profits.” And “volumes would have to rise by 18.7 percent just to offset the profit impact of a 5 percent price cut.”
The average income statement of an S&P 1500 company. A store’s own figure depends on its margins.
Consulting firmMcKinsey, “The power of pricing” (opens the source)
400–800basis points of margin from getting markdowns right
“We’ve found that markdown optimization can improve margin rates by 400 to 800 basis points.” Common missteps include discounting items “that would most likely continue to sell at full price” and markdowns “deeper than they need to be.”
Full markdown optimisation at large retailers: depth, timing and item choice, not scheduling alone.
Consulting firmMcKinsey, “Hitting the mark” (opens the source)
80%of one online retailer’s range sold below list price
An international online retailer “sold about 80 percent of its assortment below the list price. Pricing required significant manual effort and was rarely transparent.” After linking pricing and promotions, it expects revenue up 3 to 5 percent and profit up 2 to 4 points.
One retailer’s full analytics programme. The gain is expected, not measured.
Consulting firmMcKinsey, “Pricing and promotions” (opens the source)
What SalePilot does: scheduled sales and flash sales that end on time
- Schedule a sale with a start date and time, an end date and time, and a timezone.
- Discount a collection, chosen products or chosen variants by a percentage, or add a quantity break (buy more, save more).
- When the end time arrives, the prices go back on their own, with nobody logged in.
- Prices you change by hand during the sale are not overwritten. The revert report flags them for you to review.
- “Panic revert now” ends a sale at once, whatever its schedule says.
- An optional announcement bar with a live countdown switches on when the sale starts and off when it ends.
- Works without Shopify Plus.
How it works on the storefront
Two ways to apply a sale
With “Native discount (recommended)”, Shopify applies the sale as an automatic discount at cart and checkout, and product prices stay unchanged. With “Price edit”, the product page shows the sale price with the crossed-out compare-at price, and both are restored when the sale ends.
Quantity breaks
A quantity break is always a Shopify automatic discount: the listed price stays the same and the discount applies at checkout.
Countdown bar
A theme app embed called “SalePilot bar”. You type the bar text per sale and can add a live countdown token. The bar turns on when the sale applies and off when it reverts.
Install and set up, step by step
Install from the Shopify App Store
Open the SalePilot listing, install the app, log in to Shopify and choose your store. Review the permissions Shopify shows and approve. The app opens on its Home screen in your Shopify admin.
Create the sale event
Choose “New sale event”. Give it a name, then set “Start date”, “Start hour”, “Start minute”, the same for the end, and the “Timezone”. Press “Create”.
Add what is discounted
In “What’s discounted”, pick a “Discount type”, enter the “Percentage off” and choose the collection, products or variants. Press “Add rule”.
Check the prices first
Press “See the price changes first” to preview percentage-off rules. Quantity breaks are not previewed.
Schedule it
Press “Schedule this sale”. Saving alone does not start anything.
Optional: turn on the countdown bar
In Online Store, Themes, Customize, App embeds, turn on “SalePilot bar”. Then type the “Announcement bar text” in the sale’s Announcement bar panel and press “Save announcement bar”.
Your numbers
What does a sale that runs late cost?
Enter one sale from your own store. The page works out how much discount went to orders placed after the planned end, and how many orders fell into hours the sale had promised but was not yet live.
Discount given away after the planned end
The most it could be: it assumes those orders would have been placed at full price anyway.
Revenue due in the hours the sale was not yet live
Orders that arrive late or not at all. No loss rate is applied, because no source gives one.
This is arithmetic on your numbers, not a forecast or a result from our app.
How this is calculated
- Discount given away
O × (h ÷ 24) × A × d - Revenue in the missed hours
O × (s ÷ 24) × A × (1 − d)
O is orders per day, A the average order value at full price, d the discount as a share, h the hours past the end and s the hours started late. Orders are spread evenly across the day.
Context from the research, not used in the maths
- For an average S&P 1500 company, a 1% change in price moved operating profit by 8%, McKinsey calculated. Consulting firmMcKinsey, “The power of pricing” (opens the source)
Questions about SalePilot
How do I schedule a Shopify sale that ends by itself?
Create a sale event with a start, an end and a timezone, add a discount rule, then press “Schedule this sale”. SalePilot applies the prices at the start and puts them back at the end, whether or not you are logged in, typically within about a minute of the scheduled time.
What if I forget to end a sale?
Every sale event has an end time, and the end time triggers the revert. “Panic revert now” ends it sooner.
What happens to a price I edit during the sale?
SalePilot does not overwrite it. When the sale reverts, the item is flagged for review in the revert report.
Does SalePilot need Shopify Plus?
No. It works on stores without Shopify Plus.
Can I run more than one sale at once?
Yes. Each sale tracks its own prices and its own revert time. When two rules hit the same variant, the “Overlapping rules” report shows which one wins.
Does saving a sale start it?
No. A draft sale does nothing until you press “Schedule this sale”.
Is there a free plan?
Yes, a free plan is available. Plan details are on the Shopify App Store listing.
SalePilot on the Shopify App Store
- App Store name
- SalePilot: Smart Sales
- Listing subtitle
- Schedule flash sales. Each starts and ends on its own.
- Listing tagline
- A sale scheduler for flash sales and scheduled discounts. Prices revert at the end.
- Developer
- BoldnSmart, listed as Boldnsmart on the Shopify App Store
- Released
- Plan
- Free plan available
- Language
- English
- Own website
- salepilotapp.com
Already using SalePilot: Smart Sales? Leave a review on the Shopify App Store
Sources for the figures on this page
Each figure is the named source’s finding. None of them is a result of SalePilot.
- Consulting firmBoston Consulting Group, “How Retailers Can Improve Promotion Effectiveness”, Goad, Robinson, Anta Callersten, Malby and Opstrup (PDF)Open on web-assets.bcg.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmMcKinsey, “Hitting the mark: Why markdowns matter more than ever”, Bähr, Coggins, Fuerst, Reasor and RettaliataOpen on mckinsey.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmMcKinsey, “Pricing and promotions: The analytics opportunity”, Heintzeler, Kullmann, Lauer and TotzauerOpen on mckinsey.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmMcKinsey Quarterly, “The power of pricing”, Marn, Roegner and ZawadaOpen on mckinsey.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmBain & Company, “Curing the Discount Disease in Soft Goods Retail”, Israel, Makin, Caine and ChengOpen on bain.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmBoston Consulting Group, “Smarter Retailer Promotions for a Saturated Market”Open on bcg.com (opens the source)
- Consulting firmMcKinsey, “How analytics can drive growth in consumer-packaged-goods trade promotions”, Hwang, Murphy and Shaikh (citing Nielsen)Open on mckinsey.com (opens the source)
- Company filingShopify Inc., Black Friday weekend data press release, also filed with the SEC as an 8-K exhibitOpen on sec.gov (opens the source)
- SurveyDeloitte, holiday retail survey press release (4,270 US consumers)Open on deloitte.com (opens the source)
